Convinced that the moment had come for the dramatist to pack up his puppet-show and despatch it to a museum of antiquities, she laid down rules for an ideal republican literature, and prescribed strong emotions, careful analysis of character, and a high moral tone as indispensable ingredients. She was in fact one of the first to admire and write that appalling product, the novel with a purpose.
Anything duller than Delphine it would be difficult to imagine. From the first page to the last there is hardly one line of genuine inspiration. All is forced, exaggerated, overstrained. The misfortunes of the heroine are so needlessly multiplied, that they end by exasperating the reader; and the motif of the book—the contrast between conventional and moral ideals—fails in true dramatic interest. The plot is as follows: Madame de Vernon has a daughter, Mathilde, beautiful and sanctimonious, whom she desires to marry to Léonce de Mondoville, a young Spaniard of noble birth and aristocratic prejudices. Madame de Vernon has in the whole world one friend, Delphine d’Albémar, a miracle of grace, wit, and beauty, who does acts of unheard-of generosity, and generally by some evil chance accomplishes them at the moment when they lead to unlucky results for herself. She is a young widow, and has been left by her elderly and devoted husband a fortune, of which she proceeds to divest herself as rapidly as possible. One of her favorite objects of charity is Madame de Vernon, who does not deserve her pity, since the pecuniary embarrassments under which she suffers arise from her love of card-playing, and general mismanagement. But Delphine adores her friend, who is represented as extremely charming, and is in some respects a well-drawn character. Her life is one long act of dissimulation. She masks her cynicism cleverly, under an appearance of indolence, which dispenses her from ever taking inconvenient resolutions, or appearing agitated by events which should—but do not—move her. She has some faint affection for her generous dupe—Delphine; but not enough to be prevented from taking every mean advantage of her. There is some difficulty in arranging Mathilde’s marriage, on account of the want of a dowry. Delphine hastens to supply this, and then the bridegroom elect, Léonce, appears on the scene. He is described as divinely handsome. The cold and pietistic Mathilde falls in love with him immediately (as was her duty, since he was to be her husband), but so, unfortunately, does Delphine. What is still worse, he is by no means attracted by his fiancée, but reciprocates the young widow’s passion. Then the drama begins. Madame de Vernon, while seeming to see nothing, sees everything. Mathilde is really blind. Delphine is agitated, but resolved, if possible, to be happy. This, by the way, is the only gleam of common sense that she has throughout the book. Unfortunately, she manages to compromise herself (of course quite innocently) by espousing the cause of a pair of guilty but repentant lovers; and Madame de Vernon cleverly uses the awkward positions in which she places herself, in order to detach Léonce from her. He marries Mathilde and is madly unhappy. Delphine pours out her feelings in long letters to her sister-in-law and confidant, Mademoiselle d’Albémar, letters which she writes, by the way, on recovering from fainting fits, or when lying in bed, or when on the verge of distraction. The whole of the novel is told in letters, and is proportionately long-winded and unnatural.
Not long after the marriage Madame de Vernon dies, and on her death-bed confesses her perfidy to her victim. Then the mutual passion of Delphine and Léonce enters upon a new and harrowing phase. They determine to remain technically virtuous, but to see one another constantly—of course unknown to Mathilde. This unnatural situation—unnaturally prolonged, becomes unbearable through its monotonous misery.
Finally Mathilde discovers the state of the case and conjures Delphine to separate herself from Léonce. Madame d’Albémar consents, and disappears. Léonce is then described by his confidant as being on the point of madness. He alternately loses consciousness, and rushes about with dishevelled hair and distraught looks. Delphine goes to Switzerland, and there proceeds to compromise herself anew, this time beyond recall, for the sake of a rejected lover who had behaved disgracefully to her.
She had taken refuge in a convent of which the superioress, Madame de Ternan, turns out to be the aunt of Léonce. This lady is something of the same sort as Madame de Vernon—except that her egotism, although quite as systematic, is not so base. But it can become so on occasion, and, as she is rather fond of Delphine and anxious to keep her with her to solace her old age, she plays into the hands of Madame de Mondoville (the mother of Léonce) and cleverly contrives to make Delphine take the veil. Barely has this been done when Léonce appears and claims her as his own, Mathilde having in the meanwhile died. Then is the exhausted reader harassed anew by a fresh spectacle of poignant anguish. A Monsieur de Sebersci suggests that Delphine should break her vows, quit her convent, and join Léonce, pointing out that, thanks to the Revolution, they can be quite respectably married in France. Delphine is horrified at first, but Léonce having announced the firm intention of putting an end to his existence if she remains a nun, she finally escapes and joins him. One begins to hope that they are going to be happy at last, when the “purpose” of the book presents itself. Madame de Staël was anxious to prove that social conventions may not be braved with impunity, but overtake and crush the nature which defies them. Delphine throughout had listened to no voice but that of her conscience and her heart; she is consequently the victim of calumny. Léonce is principally swayed by passion. He defies society in the end to possess Delphine, but has no sooner induced her to break her vows for him than he begins to feel the stigma of the act. He leaves her, and seeks death on the battle-field. Death spares him, but he is arrested as an aristocrat and condemned to be shot. Delphine follows him, and by her eloquence wrings a pardon from the judge. Léonce, enlightened by the approach of death as to the nothingness of the world’s opinion, is prepared to live happily at last with the woman whom he still professes to adore. But all at once the order for his release is rescinded and he is taken out to die. Delphine accompanies him, and talks all along the road. Indeed, she is superfluously eloquent, from the first page of her history to the last. When Léonce has been strung up by her to the highest pitch of exalted feeling, she takes poison and dies at his feet. He is then shot; and the lovers are interred in one grave by Monsieur de Serbellane, who has appeared again in the last chapter, after having been the primary though unwitting cause of his unhappy friends’ woes.
It is difficult to understand why critics like Sainte Beuve should so warmly have praised this novel. No doubt it shows talent, especially in the analysis of mental struggle; but it is false from beginning to end. All the characters want vitality, although some of the qualities attributed to them are described with penetration and force. Delphine and Léonce talk too much, and faint too much, and are simply insupportable. Finally, the book is drearily monotonous and unrelieved by one gleam of poetry or humor.
Corinne is a classic of which everybody is bound to speak with respect. The enormous admiration which it excited at the time of its appearance may seem somewhat strange in this year of grace; but then it must be remembered that Italy was not the over-written country it has since become. Besides this, Madame de Staël was the most celebrated woman, and, after Napoleon, the most conspicuous personage of her day. Except Châteaubriand, she had nobody to dispute with her the palm of literary glory in France. Her exile, her literary circle, her courageous opinions, had kept the eyes of Europe fixed on her for years, so that any work from her pen was sure to excite the liveliest curiosity.
Corinne is a kind of glorified guide-book, with some of the qualities of a good novel. It is very long-winded, but the appetite of the age was robust in that respect, and the highly-strung emotions of the hero and heroine could not shock a taste which had been formed by the Sorrows of Werther. It is extremely moral, deeply sentimental, and of a deadly earnestness—three characteristics which could not fail to recommend it to a dreary and ponderous generation, the most deficient in taste that ever trod the earth.
But it is artistic in the sense that the interest is concentrated from first to last on the central figure, and the drama, such as it is, unfolds itself naturally from its starting-point, which is the contrast between the characters of Oswald and Corinne.
Oswald Lord Nelvil is a young man of exquisite sensibility and profound melancholy. He comes to Rome (after distinguishing himself heroically during a fire at Ancona) accompanied by a young Frenchman, the Count D’Erfeuil, whom he has casually met. One of the first sights which greets them on their arrival in the Eternal City is the triumphal procession of “Corinne” on her way to be crowned in the Capitol. She is a musician, an improvisatrice, a Muse or Sibyl, with all the poetry and passion of Italy stamped upon her radiant brow. In the midst of her improvisation she exchanges glances with Lord Nelvil, and the fate of both is sealed. He is intended to be a typical Englishman imbued with a horror of eccentricity in women. His ideal of the sex is a domestic angel, and he feels bound to disapprove of Corinne, who lives alone, though young and beautiful, and offers the spectacle of her various talents to the profane view of the crowd. The Count D’Erfeuil mocks at everything, and is the most amusing character in the book; feels no scruples about knowing Corinne, and, having quickly discovered that his reserved English friend pleases her, he persuades that gentleman to call on her also. Corinne speaks English wonderfully, and allows Lord Nelvil to divine that there is a mystery about her past. Once she betrays great agitation on hearing the name of Edgermond, which is the patronymic of a certain Lucile, whom Lord Nelvil’s father had destined him to marry. Grief at the death of this father is, by the way, the ostensible cause of his persistent melancholy, but he also vaguely hints at remorse. He promises that he will one day confide his history to Corinne, who on her side prepares herself to tell him hers. But as she greatly fears the effect of it on him, and is deeply in love, she puts off the evil hour, and, in order to keep him with her, offers to be his cicerone in Rome. Together they wander among the ruins, visit the galleries, and drive on the Appian Way. Corinne explains everything, discourses on everything, and Oswald interrupts her with exclamations of rapture at her wit and learning. This novel form of courtship lasts for some weeks, and finally the lovers proceed to Naples. Corinne persuades Oswald that there is nothing at all extraordinary in such conduct in Italy, where everyone, according to her, may do as he likes. But the Count L’Erfeuil makes remarks which, although intended to be merely flippant, are sensible enough to convince Lord Nelvil that he must either marry Corinne or leave her. He is very much in love, or fancies himself so. Nevertheless he hesitates because of the mystery surrounding his inamorata. Who is she? What is her name? Whence comes her fortune? If she is not quite blameless, he thinks he can never marry her, for that would be derogating from the traditions of his order and outraging the shade of his father. The mental struggle which he undergoes is visible to Corinne and fills her with anguish and alarm. At last, during an expedition to Vesuvius, Oswald speaks. He had been at one time in love with an unworthy Frenchwoman; had lingered in France when his father required his presence in England, and had finally returned, only to find him dead. From that hour he had known no peace; remorse had pursued him; his filial love, which was morbidly excessive, caused him to look upon himself as almost a parricide, and he considered that he was thenceforward morally bound to do nothing which his father might disapprove. This absurd conclusion afflicts Corinne visibly, and the sight of her agitation reawakens all Oswald’s doubts. He conjures her to tell him her history. She consents; but begs for a few days’ grace, and employs the interval in planning and carrying out a fête on Cape Misenum. In front of the azure, tideless sea she takes her lyre and pours out an improvisation on the past glories of that classic shore. This, although Oswald does not know it, is an adieu to her past life, for she foresees that what she has to tell him of herself will entirely change her destiny. Either he will refuse to marry her, and then she will never know happiness again, but wingless, voiceless, will go down to her tomb, or else he will make her his wife, and the Sibyl will be lost in the peeress.